Volunteers Needed For Courtyard Project

Thu., June 8, 2000

By Mike Prager mikeprager15@gmail.com (509) 459-5454

Residents of a low-income apartment building downtown are looking for volunteers to help expand a garden and courtyard outside the brick building.

Members of the Unitarian Church and the Spokane Community Gardens organization helped get the garden started this spring.

Jeremy Street, a resident of the Wilton Apartments at Pacific and Browne, wants to create an inviting outdoor environment on what was once a dirt lot.

“I am trying to get some public interest in it and an infusion of color,” he said. “I’m just trying to make stuff happen here.”

On Saturday, Street and other volunteers will work from 1 to 4 p.m. on the project.

Street said he recently helped install 250 square feet of sod. He has collected about 100 donated bricks and needs about 300 more so he can build a patio surface.

In April, Spokane Community Gardens installed two raised-bed garden boxes, which are now filled with vegetables.

The owner of the Wilton, the Spokane Housing Ventures organization, has endorsed the project. But the nonprofit housing agency doesn’t have money to finance the courtyard project.

Rents for the 50 single-room apartments are kept as low as possible so homeless people can get housing and start rebuilding their lives.

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